Friday I'm In Love: Haircuts

Ever since the kids were small, they've gotten haircuts at the local cheapo hair chain - with occasional (abysmal) trims by me. But the truth is, Lovebug has thick, wiry hair that requires actual skill to cut. Especially now that he no longer wants it buzzed supershort. Ironflower's hair is challenging, thanks to the wave and the length. And Hot Guy needed a good haircut for some stuff he's got going on in the next few weeks. So Hot Guy took the kids to an actual hair salon. It was slightly less than double the price of el cheapo, but. . .

They even straightened her hair for her. She'll probably be stealing my hair dryer before I know it. 

I finally got Lovebug to look at the camera! I really don't care that we were in the middle of Gamestop when it happened. 

You can't even really see Hugmonkey's haircut in this picture, but this is his go-to pose now. I couldn't convince him to change it. 

Ironflower modeling her dance company warm-up jacket. There are enough crystals on the back to please a Las Vegas showgirl. She loves it.

We're going to have to keep going to the nice hair salon, aren't we? My kids haven't had such neat hair in years. 

I'm Empowered, NOT Invisible

I got my haircut yesterday. Thanks to my great fear of pregnancy/post-partum hormones and hair decisions arising from them(at least I learned from the dye job that made me look like a goth after I had Ironflower), I have not had a haircut since July. Except for the bangs I cut myself in September (hormones + stress = I'm convinced I can fix my own hair problems). Anyway, my hair had gotten quite long. Hot Guy LOVES long hair - and doesn't notice things like split ends or style when the hair is long - so I felt slightly bad chopping it off. But only slightly.

Besides, I didn't chop it ALL off. Just about four inches (my hair grows really fast). So now it's shoulder length and layered to encourage the wave and all that. I actually kind of like it now. But I was a little worried about what Hot Guy would think, since he's such a big fan of long hair.

When I got home, he said it looked good. But as we talked (and I confessed to buying product too) I realized that he looked slightly . . .guilty. Shifty. Not happy. I started questioning him. Finally he admitted, "You'll be mad if I tell you what I really think."

I was kinda surprised. After all, it wasn't like it was truly short. But since I was sure it was cute I knew I could handle his opinion, no matter how bad it was. I told him to tell me the truth.

"I can't tell the difference, " he said fearfully. He then went on to explain that since I wear it back so much and since it always "looks nice" when I wear it down. . . well, it just didn't look any different to him.

"But I cut off FOUR INCHES!" I exclaimed. He nodded and looked at me as though expecting a blow. I wasn't mad, though - I was just relieved that he didn't want me to grow it out again. Okay, and a little shocked at his lack of observational powers.

The shock and relief may have turned to a little bit of frustration when he went on to explain that he doesn't really notice whether I'm wearing make-up or not. "WHAT?" I said, possibly quite loudly. I'm very pale. My skin is uneven. I have straight eyelashes. I look A LOT better when I put on make-up. The difference is palpable. The comments from other people on how rested or not rested I look correlate WAY more to how much make-up I have on than to how much actually sleep I have gotten.

Hot Guy, possibly feeling more confident because I wasn't acting mad, went on to explain that I always looked fine - and the same - to him. Though he did make sure to point out that I did look especially nice when we got dressed up.

I'm not sure what to do with this information. Although it's caused me to realize - as I put on concealer and blush this morning - that I definitely don't do these things for my husband's benefit. (Since he doesn't EVEN NOTICE) It's so empowering to know that I style my hair and do my make-up for me. . .isn't it?